New detox center targets substance abuse, mental health
Published Saturday, December 20, 2008
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FAIRBANKS — What started out as a fantasy of someday providing extensive care to substance abusers became a reality for several nonprofit organizations Friday night with the opening of the Golden Heart Gateway to Recovery Enhanced Detox Center on South Cushman Street.
Not only is the 10,000-square-foot facility designed to provide services that integrate mental health and substance abuse treatment, it also is expected to limit the revolving door that has seen many of the same inebriates, sometimes on a weekly basis.
The center has the potential to save millions of dollars in community resources, namely those of the Fairbanks police department, Fairbanks Memorial Hospital and Fairbanks Correctional Center. Fairbanks Police Chief Dan Hoffman called the facility an asset to the community.
With a 60 percent increase in capacity, the program will replace the Ralph Perdue Center and offer mental health assessments, case management and referrals for a variety of treatment.
Kate Wood, director of the detox center, couldn’t stop smiling Friday as she walked guests through the facility.
“This facility has been a long time coming,” she said. “I’m hoping it will brighten people’s spirits and serve a lot more people by making it easier for them to get extensive treatment which is more than we’ve been able to do.”
Guy Patterson, director of Fairbanks Native Association’s Behavioral Health Services, said the goal was to get people off the street and into treatment.
“This new facility is step one in that process,” Patterson said. “We are treating the very ill who need help right away but the next step is opening the door to more treatment options and making sure that treatment is available.”
The Fairbanks Native Association, Fairbanks Community Behavioral Health Center, Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, Tanana Chiefs Conference Chief Andrew Isaac Health Center and the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority will operate the facility.
“We couldn’t have done it without all the other agencies,” Patterson said. “Fairbanks is an amazing community in that we have the kind of support and interaction among many agencies for achieving a goal like this.”
The facility’s funding model is unique to Alaska and will set a precedent for social service agencies across the state, according to Commissioner Bill Hogan with the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services.
“This is truly an essential partnership,” Hogan said. “This is absolutely the way we have to approach substance abuse treatment because no one entity has enough money to do it.”
Before becoming commissioner, Hogan served as the first director of the Alaska Division of Behavioral Health and pushed for an integrated health system.
According to Hogan, 65 percent of individuals suffering both substance abuse and mental health disorders, which is called a co-occurring disorder.
“From a state perspective, we certainly can provide some funding and technical assistance but the solutions for substance abuse problems come from within the community,” Hogan said. “It’s essential that we create more facilities with integrated treatment programs across the state.”
Members of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation were at the open house because they have an interest opening a similar program, according to an e-mail from Greg MacIntire, vice president of social services for the Yukon-Kuskokwim Health Corporation.
The Fairbanks Community Enhanced Detox Center will open in January.
Community Discussion
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Hope this time it works. What hodge-podge of red tape and honorable intentions brought the Ralph Perdue Center on line and now what do we do with that building besides pay the heat and electric bills?
If state and federal money dries up who will pay the bills for this new center?
What is the estimated costs per year to operate this detox center?
The agencies who pooled their programs for this new center are all receiving state/federal funds & grants now. I am concerned that if funding sources dry up will the local tax payers be ask to make up the difference?
I do support efforts to address our substance abuse and mental health issues in our community. Being under one roof may just be the real solution. We shall see.......
Oh Great! Someplace to put the wife!!!
Will there be a medical director for this center? Are you going to 'ban' certain inebriates from the facility after they leave in the middle of treatment and decide to return after their upteenth trip... sending them back through the already preexisting revolving door? Are you going to provide transportation to this facility from CAIC/ FMH/ outpatient care facilities, or will FPD or CSP be responsible?
Rather than skeptism and cynicism lets think about hope for lost souls. People don't wake up and decide to become alcoholics one day, they evolve thru cause and effect, whether genetic or enviromental. We all have an obligation, like it or don't, know it or don't, to take care of our brothers, in one way or another. If we choose to ignore it that is on us. If we choose to help, that is on us. So, it's back to the 60's, your either part of the cause or part of the solution. This is a wonderful opportunity for people that right now have no hope at all. Let's all give it a chance to work and good luck with your wife Rogerx:)
Firedog: You can't tell? I'm single. LOL
If I were married, I probably wouldn't be able to type stuff like this and survive. Without the threat of a wife around... life is GREAT!!! :-)
(Alcoholics are just like little kids. You tell them, "doing drugs and drinking is bad for the health" and "don't do that". Turn your back for a second and they're back to touching the stove burner. From my brief research, alcoholics really do regress into a child like mental state due to the brain deteriorating from the toxins of the liver/pancrease. Just like giving the wife a credit card and telling her not to use it! ;-)
I read thru this article and one thing they did not mention, forgot, or just didn't want to report. This facility is also taking in sex offenders now. Something that the Detox unit we have now does not do. So they are treating mentally ill, intoxicated or withdrawing alcohol and drug abusers who may be possible sex offenders further away from town and police assistance. You do the math.
I'm hoping they're well separated. Most don't know, alcoholism usually requires psychological counseling.
Shouldn't sexual predators be in outpatient care? And if their addiction gets bad enough requiring such a thing as this, they probably should be in jail -- based on the the fact they pose a danger to others health & safety.
I don't see a difference between hitting a child abusively and sexually abusing. All are abusive, and hitting a child takes a lot less energy & time.
Not only this, if my wife or daughter had problems, I would then surely avoid sending them to such a facility. So Ravyn86, I don't know how accurate your last statement is, and the specifics. Those predators, I would believe, go through outpatient care or get jailed.
I think all sex offenders should be hung in the gallows. . . . .
This would replace just the current detox facility at the Ralph Perdue Center. It would not replace the other, longer-term programs at the RPC, in fact, it would allow those programs to expand.
A detox center requires a lot of state, federal and private money to operate; they are staffed with nurses 24-hours a day. If funding dries up, the center closes. We are back to the old Fairbanks of a few years ago with drunks lying in the doorways downtown.
But a few hundred thousand spent here means millions are saved at the hospital, downtown is cleaner and the folks who use the center get to dry out in a safe place while they are monitored by people who care.
Mentally-ill people who medicate themselves with alcohol or opiates are very hard to treat; my hat is off to the compassionate staff who welcomes our neighbors and cares for them with respect and hope.
opendialogue: After having first hand experience, I agree.
If they haven't commited a crime there is no legal means to keep them in jail. Once that person has served their time you can't legally keep punishing them unless they break the law. You are not detoxed from alcohol or drugs as an outpatient because there is no true way to monitor the person or keep them from mixing the alcohol/illegal drugs with the detox medication (thats a lawsuit waiting to happen). If this person need to be monitored they will be in the "proper environment", same as a person who has a heart attack goes to FMH. You can't deny them access to healthcare if they haven't done anything bad there.
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